Seconds

He never believed what they said. Time can't slow down. It's impossible. But now, he believes it. He hears the ticking of the clock behind him, no longer at the speed it is usually at, but slower. Much, much slower.

Scott is choking. His brother's murderer is actually choking. Dying. Scott Ellisson is dying.

Good.

Scott's eyes travel to Ethan's face and his hand searches for Ethan's. He grips it tightly, begging Ethan for help.

And then the milliseconds feel like hours. Ethan feels the rigid movement from Scott's hand and Ethan tries to pull away, but his hand feels glued to the metal. He watches as blood mingles with the other fluid in Scott's mouth and gasping 'help's stream towards his ears. He feels himself shaking. His eyes look straight at Scott. He wanted to see this happen, he cannot deny that.

But it's happening and Ethan isn't sure he wants it to happen. Scott will get away with the murder of Cal if he dies. Yet that doesn't stop Ethan from wanting him to stop breathing.

He's a doctor. He has an oath. He has to do something. But his mind wonders to what's outside the door. No-one was out there when he entered. No-one saw him come in and no-one will see him leaving. He can walk away right now and Scott will die.

He bites the inside of his lip and watches Scott struggle, his hand losing its rigidity and movement. He has stopped hearing the pleas for help and is instead hearing the singular sound of his brother's murderer dying.

He feels lost and found at the same time. He feels like he doesn't know what to do and he knows exactly what to do at the same time. His brain isn't caught up with his moments and his hand moves to the emergency button behind Scott's bed with no conscious command. With shaking hands he unstraps the material holding Scott's head still and watches as his eyes fill with hopelessness and pain, longing to be helped. A flurry of his colleagues rush into the room and suddenly, Ethan can do nothing but watch.

He steps back, his whole body trembles and fills with a sense of numbness. They roll Scott on his side and Ethan does nothing but watch as Connie barks out commands while holding Scott and Lily holds Scott's head still and Tash suctions and makes sure Scott's still breathing and outside the door is Charlie, keeping a hysterical Denise from entering.

Ethan had seconds to decide what to do, whether to help Scott or leave him. He wouldn't have known what the outcome would have been if he had left Scott to choke, but the probability of him surviving would have been slim. Yet he decided to help. No-one would have known if he'd just walked away...

The man on the bed breathes fine now. He's getting help, getting seen to and getting saved. He is in no serious danger.

Ethan has potentially saved the life of his brother's murderer. He doesn't feel so numb anymore.

He doesn't spare a thought for anyone or anything as he rushes out of HDC, straight for the bathrooms. He roughly pushes open the door and collapses hard on his knees inside one of the cubicles, not even bothering to close the door. He vomits painfully into the bowl, his throat burning with the acidity of it.

When he's sure he's finished, he spits out what's left in his mouth and leans back against the side of the cubicle, wiped out. Exhaustion and the lack of food he's intaken recently are finally starting to catch up with him, the strain of the last couple of months coming to a head.

He shuts his eyes and breathes deeply. He just saved the life of the racist, homophobic murderer that killed his brother and then boasted about it.

Ethan already regrets it.

It wasn't as if he was going to kill him. Yes, it had not skipped his mind, but he never actually would. But he hadn't planned on saving him either when he could have so easily left him to die. All he had wanted was proof of his confession, proof that Scott did it so that man could be arrested, but he'd just saved Scott's life when he didn't deserve to breathe another breath.

"Ethan," Charlie sighs as he knees down to the side of him.

Ethan tiredly opens his eyes and looks at him.

"Come on. Let's go to my office," he says.

He barely thinks as Charlie helps him stand and guides him out, flushing away Ethan's meagre lunch in the process. He doesn't register Alicia's concerned face of Duffy's offers to help. He only really starts to connect back with reality when Charlie pushes him gently onto a chair and gives him a mint. Ethan only holds it in his hand, lacking the energy to put it in his mouth.

"Thanks," he mutters anyway.

Charlie rubs Ethan's knee. "I know it's been tough. I don't know what Scott said to you earlier and what you were even doing in there but -"

"He admitted it," Ethan rushes out.

Charlie's eyes go wide. "What?"

Ethan feels a tear drip down his cheek and he makes no move to wipe it away. "He killed my brother, Charlie. He admitted it."

Charlie sits down beside him. "Ethan... you need to tell the police."

"Then he boasted about it. When he knew he wasn't dying... he was gloating about it. About how we were obliged to help him because... we're doctors -" he spits the word like it's poison "- when he killed Cal."

Charlie tries to get him to focus back. "I'll ring the police now, okay?"

"And I saved him. I got him help. I got him help, Charlie!" His agitated state makes his leg start bouncing up and down quickly.

The nurse looks at him kindly. "You did the right thing," he says, quick to reassure him.

"I could have walked away. I should have!" He feels his throat close up and his tears fall faster. "I should have left him to die, Charlie! He left my brother bleeding out and I saved him!"

And then he hunches forward as his sobs take over.

Charlie listens to the recording with a grim look on his face. Ethan has calmed enough to talk but he hears Scott boasting for the second time and it makes him feel nauseous. He doesn't want to hear it again, it was enough to hear it once.

"And earlier," Charlie says once the recording ends, "when I took you out of the room..."

"Yeah. He confessed then."

Charlie hesitates. "What did he say?"

Ethan felt himself close to tears once again as he repeats what Scott said. Charlie's face morphs into disgust and sympathy, one after the other. "I think he was telling the truth. He must have been, right? I mean... he must have been. And that scares me, Charlie! Cal brought it upon himself, he fought with Scott. Scott didn't target him. If I had picked up my phone Cal would have known I was safe... he wouldn't have gone for Scott and he wouldn't have died!"

He can see the helpless look on Charlie's face as he sits there.

"I had seconds, seconds, to decide what to do. Why did I have to get him help, Charlie?" he whispers as his energy drains rapidly. "Why couldn't I have just... walked away?"

"Because then you wouldn't be our Ethan. You did have seconds to decide and I bet you considered walking away, but you would have regretted this for the rest of your life."

"If I hadn't have been there Charlie he would have died. Why did I even -"

"You can't think about what you should have or should not have done or the ifs and the buts. They'll destroy you, Ethan. We have Scott's confession. He'll go to prison. It will all be over."

"I guess," he mutters.

"Come on. You look exhausted. Go and sleep in the on-call room for a bit, I don't think you should be driving right now. I can get someone else to cover the rest of your shift."

And as Ethan lies down ten minutes later, his head resting on the pillow, all he can think about was what actually might have happened in Cal's last few hours, and he vows to go to Cal's grave later and hope that, maybe, Cal replies.

A/N The present tense is SO hard to write in so there will more than likely be mistakes that I missed when proofreading, so the tense might have swapped in parts and I just missed it. But I've read through this so many times now that I'm just seeing nothing but writing and I can't read through anymore. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed and if you have time, a review would be nice!